


The Most Painful Companion

by Anne_Animouse



Category: Being Human
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-20
Updated: 2010-12-20
Packaged: 2017-10-13 21:48:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,121
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/142060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anne_Animouse/pseuds/Anne_Animouse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>“Guilt is perhaps the most painful companion of death.” - Coco Chanel</i></p><p>Everyone has their own way of coping.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Most Painful Companion

**Author's Note:**

  * For [crysgen78](https://archiveofourown.org/users/crysgen78/gifts).



> Spoilers through the end of series 2.

**Annie had been gone for one week.**

Mitchell had locked himself away in his room, refusing to speak to anyone. The only time he left the room was when he would sit quietly at the kitchen table, listening with rapt attention to the radio's continuing coverage of the Box Tunnel 20, and the vague clues of the oncoming vampire uprising. He blamed himself for what had happened. He blamed himself for what continued to happen in his absence. But most of all, he blamed himself for Annie. After all, it was his girlfriend and her secret boss who had been responsible for Annie's crossing over. If it weren't for him letting his guard down, and getting attached to a mortal, none of this would have happened. If he hadn't invited them into their home, they would still be together.

George knew that wasn't right. It had been George's idea to go to the clinic, after all. George had talked Annie into going with him, and she had stayed with him, despite her misgivings. She had had her own reasons for going to the clinic, but he knew she wouldn't have gone if George hadn't encouraged it. Mitchell hadn't forced them to go. In fact, he had shown up to rescue them. He'd been half-crazed with bloodlust, and blinded by rage, but he had shown up with the intention of saving his friends. So it couldn't have been Mitchell's fault.

 **Annie had been gone for two weeks.**

Nina had barely spoken to anyone since that night. She had locked herself away in the study, surrounded by articles, books, newspapers and tabloids, desperately searching for some clue as to the location of one Professor Lucy Jaggat, and her scattered band of co-conspirators. She blamed herself for what had happened. She was the one who had fallen for their ploy of having a cure for their condition. She was the one who had shown up at the house, and bullied George and Annie into going to the clinic in the first place. If she hadn't used her relationship with George, and his guilt over infecting her (whether deserved or not), they would all still be living happily together in their little house in Bristol, not hold up heartsick in a damp cottage in Wales.

But George knew she was wrong. If George hadn't infected Nina in the first place, she never would have had to find a cure. She never would have been susceptible to the charms and lies of the cult. Nina hadn't forced George and Annie to go to the clinic. She had left them the card, and opened the door, but George had walked through it, and his thoughtlessness had pushed Annie ahead of him.

 **Annie had been gone for three weeks.**

George hadn't locked himself away anywhere. He had started taking long walks alone, wandering the barren wastes surrounding the hovel they now called home. He hadn't stopped talking to anyone, but spent each moment they would allow talking to everyone. In fact, his talking was almost incessant. He was nervous, and he was guilty. And when he was nervous, or guilty, or both, he talked. Annie had known that. She would sit on the sofa while he paced around the living room, ranting and raving and waving his arms like a lunatic, and then, just when he had worked himself up into a right lather, she would say the one thing that would bring him back around to himself. And he would stop. And he would think. And once he had thought about it, he would realise it wasn't nearly as bad as he had thought it was. And then usually he would laugh. Or cry. Or sometimes just sit down. And she would wrap her cool but comforting arms around his shoulder and they would sit together. And everything would be better.

No one sat on the couch with him now. He hadn't even seen that comfortable couch or that cozy living room since leaving for the clinic. On his quest for a "cure". To leave the world of ghosts and vampires and werewolves behind, and run head-long into the world of normalcy. And Annie had followed along behind him. She had warned him at the time that it would be the last time they saw their house. But he hadn't believed her. He'd shrugged it off. He'd figured that he would go and get his cure, and then they would go home together, and everything would be perfect. He'd have his Annie, he'd have his Mitchell, and he'd have his humanity.

Nevermind that a human wouldn't be able to see Annie. Never mind that without his werewolf blood, he'd be nothing more than a temptation for Mitchell. He'd be human, and the rest of the world would bend itself around him to make it right for him. Annie had known it wouldn't work, but she had followed him anyway, because that was what friends did. She had put off her own crossing over to make his journey back to humanity easier. She had sat on the bunk in their cell, and he had ranted and raved, and she had waited until the perfect moment to bring him back around to the real world. And in a way, he had waited for that moment too.

But that moment hadn't come. Because he'd waited too long. He'd been so caught up in himself, that he'd neglected to see her slipping away until it was too late. And now she was gone.

So he didn't lock himself away. He didn't shut himself down. He walked around the woods, he walked around the house, he paced the tiny kitchen and the minuscule living room... and he talked. He talked to Nina, who didn't listen. He talked to Mitchell, who didn't answer. And he talked to Annie, who couldn't hear him. He paced the living room, waving his arms and ranting and waiting... waiting for Annie's quiet voice and kind words to make everything right again.

 **Annie had been gone for four weeks.**

Professor Jaggat was dead. Kemp was... whatever he was. And Annie was still missing. But she had managed, against all odds and by breaking every rule in the book, to bring them hope. They knew now that she was still out there, that somewhere she was waiting for them. She had saved them from Kemp, and by doing so saved them from their guilt. There would be time enough to make amends once Annie had been rescued.

Because now Annie needed them. She had saved them as best she could, and now it was their turn to save her. Because whatever happened next, there was four of them now.


End file.
